I’ve a confession to make. I’m a bit of a fan of Flo, the Progressive girl. Indeed, I’ve gone so far as to become one of the 300,000-plus fans of her Facebook page. And let me tell you, it’s not often I become a Facebook fan of anything to do with insurance!
So who’s Flo, I hear you ask. Well, she’s the star of the TV ads of US underwriter Progressive Insurance. I came across them a year or so ago on a Florida holiday and have kept track of Flo’s progress ever since. Frankly, as insurance ads go, they’re pretty damn good. And what’s interesting from a UK perspective is how darned customer-centric they are. Progressive’s core pitch is that we’ll make a policy to suit you – we’ll even build one from scratch.
Flo has proved a bit of a hit with American viewers and has graduated to her own social media campaign involving Facebook and YouTube. In order to engage viewers, Flo is now appealing for people to join her in her ads, which they can do by sending in an audition video – and that’s precisely what American viewers are doing.
Progressive’s campaign shows how you can take a well-worn product and with a bit of thought, some quirky humour and the right actress, you can make ads that really have an impact on their audience.
It’s fascinating to see something that we in the FWD Digital team have been talking about for a number of months now being reflected in the press, namely articles highlighting the increasing use of social media by disgruntled insurance claimants to vent their spleens. Click here to read the latest article from Post magazine on the subject.
Technology has given claimants the ability to make damaging and downright nasty comments about their insurers on potentially thousands of online cubby-holes. For example, we recently dealt with a journalist who’d picked up a story about an annoyed claimant from the online motorbike forum where he was busy broadcasting his insurer’s particular failings!
That said, Twitter and Facebook are the buzz-words at the moment, and that’s where the bulk of these comments tend to end up. Twitter has gone from relative obscurity to global recognition in less than 12 months while Facebook took just two years to attract 50 million users compared to 38 years for radio and 13 for TV! (Incidentally, Facebook now has 350 million users.)
Insurers need to take note: monitoring and tracking online comment was once thought of as a bit of a waste of time, after all, it’s just teenagers messing about, isn’t it? Wrong. Most social media users are mature and are quite happy to reveal just how awful their car, household and even business claim was handled.
In order to help the insurance industry keep track of what going on out there, we’ve developed our own social media monitoring service for insurers and their claims teams. If you’d like to know more, click here and start finding out what the online world is saying about you.
AS A DIGITAL consultant at FWD I’ve spent the last couple of days trying to find case studies of B2B brands that have successfully integrated online communications into their marketing mix. This is proving to be harder than you may think, especially when looking for a UK brand.
Our first hand experience as FWD Digital has highlighted that very few financial service organisations have ventured into the online space any further than just having a website. We’ve found that the majority of them accept they should be involved in SEO and social media but, because they don’t know where to start, or due to a lack of resources, many of them keep putting activity off. Twitter and Facebook are perceived as being a teenage playground where no real business is done, and LinkedIn is just seen as a networking tool with no function in brand building or lead generation.
Our presentation explaining why social media and SEO is relevant to B2B brands has yet to fail in winning marketing directors and PR teams round. A few of our points are;
the fastest growing demographic on Facebook is the over 35s
the average age on LinkedIn is 41
49% of LinkedIn users are the business decision maker,
Twitter has 4,000 insurance-related posts a day
All of the social media sites can be great brand building, networking and lead generation tools if used correctly as there are so many industry experts, journalists and thought leaders using them everyday. With all of them, though, it is about using them strategically, familiarising yourself with how they work and then trying to fight through the noise to create your own space of relevant information where you can join or start a conversation. This video that is currently 14th in the viral video rankings with over 1 million views, clearly demonstrates that social media cannot be ignored any longer.
Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it’s a failure on my part to fully embrace the possibilities of social media, but recently I’ve begun to hit a blank when I think about what to put in my status updates. Not only do I have to maintain a family and a professional career, but now I also have to think about condensing my life into a series of 140 character tweets or updates and sending them out for the world’s consideration. That’s a lot of pressure!
And now there are so many status updates to think about. There’s my LinkedIn profile, my Facebook page, my Twitter account, not to mention my GMail status and Friends Reunited. (What? I hear you say. Are you really still messing about on Friends Reunited? Yes, I’m afraid I am.)
Frankly, I’m in danger of running out of things to say about myself. I’ve prepared plans, created media coaching courses, written strategies, fended off hostile journos…and still the blank status update field looms before me like an intellectual black hole. What can I say to fill the void? What can I write about that will make me look good, yet still seem cool and slightly aloof from this materialistic world?
As a PR consultant, one of my issues is that much of what I do is unbroadcastable. Imagine: just saved Octopus Underwriting from front page scandal involving CEO’s sexual proclivities. Not going to happen is it. Or how about: just told big porkie to journalist to save Billy the Broker from scathing media criticism? That’s a no-no – and before any journos out there ask, no, I don’t tell you big porkies anyway.
So what am I left with? Making the coffee, looking for a new Biro and spilling soup all over my keyboard. Not really the stuff of hard core professional updates.
As if to taunt me, I’m compelled to marvel at the richness and variety of the status updates produced by David Worsfold, Group Editorial Director at Incisive Media. The man is a status update dynamo. One minute he’s sorting out the All Party Group, the next he’s leading a social media course, then reading War and Peace, then linking his Twitter account to his LinkedIn profile, then updating his blog…The list is endless. I cannot keep up with him. How does he do it?
I, in contrast, stare at the blank What-are-you-doing-now? field and my brain crashes like an aging PC.
Craig Freeman, FWD's social media and SEO specialist
Craig Freeman is FWD’s latest recruit: an SEO (search engine optimisation) and social media specialist who has joined us as Digital Consultant. We thought you might be interested to know a bit more about Craig so here are his vital stats:
1. Why did you join FWD?
When I met the people from FWD, they demonstrated a real desire to grow their knowledge of the online environment and asked me to present to the whole team about SEO and social media. It quickly became apparent that these factors could benefit a large number of FWD’s clients if implemented correctly and I was subsequently offered a role with the company.
Everyone at FWD was very welcoming during my work experience and they all wanted to talk through how they could make use of the different online tools to add to the marketing and PR services they currently offer clients. It was this forward thinking outlook that encouraged me to accept the role as I feel that digital media can provide tools and techniques that can really benefit FWD’s clients.
2. How did you get into SEO & Social Media?
I left university in 2007 and got a job with a gap year company called Changing Worlds. This is a not-for-profit company organising voluntary work placements abroad for school leavers and students. My role was to look at their existing print and online marketing activities and establish what was working, what was ineffectual and what other tactics they could use.
It was a role that grew organically: I was given a free reign to try out different techniques. I quickly established that their target market was easily accessible online and started learning and using SEO and social media to position Changing Worlds in front of this audience. This involved setting up a Facebook page, ensuring they had links and adverts on quality websites and looking at how to ensure their website was easily accessible through search engines.
It was the instant and ever-evolving nature of this environment that really grabbed my interest as results would show within hours if the changes I made started to drive traffic and encourage interaction. Since then I have built up experience working for a health and fitness website and a West End marketing agency.
3. How does SEO fit into the general insurance market?
49% of online purchases originate from a search engine such as Google, Yahoo or Bing. Therefore it’s easy to see why the majority of consumer-facing companies are focusing on SEO as a method of boosting sales and brand awareness. The benefit of SEO within B2B environments is not as clear cut but it is still a key marketing tool. Consumer facing insurance companies easily fit the existing SEO model and should be able to see good levels of growth, but B2B facing insurance companies need to invest in SEO for different reasons. Appearing high up in search results will position a company as a high profile player within the industry. It can ensure they are in a potential clients thinking when looking for a new service provider or sending out a tender, while also increasing the chances of journalists picking up press releases or asking for opinions on breaking stories.
4. How does social media fit into the general insurance market?
Social media is being used in B2B environments at an ever increasing rate. Facebook pages, LinkedIn groups, Blogs and Twitter posts are likely to be familiar phrases for most companies in any sector, but have you heard of RSS, Ning, Twitterfeed or Twitpic? There are always new ways to increase the spread of your brand across the Web and by being active now you will be able to ride the wave of each new trend as it breaks. The competitive advantage that can be gained through social media is invaluable. If you paid for the equivalent coverage in advertising you would most likely have to triple your budget.
Social media provides a method of demonstrating your brand’s personality.
5. Where were you educated?
A-levels at Caterham School in Surrey followed by an honours degree in Business Administration at Coventry University, graduating in July 2007. For this I wrote my dissertation on Customer Relationship Marketing looking at Internet advertising.
6. Where do you live?
I still live in my home town of Caterham, Surrey close to junction 6 of the M25. I have, though, just secured a flat in Balham that I will be moving into with my girlfriend later this month.
7. Which social media sites do you use?
I use Facebook and Twitter daily, probably more than I used to now I have an iPhone. I also write a blog using Google’s Blogger platform and I have a LinkedIn account. I use Flickr, YouTube, Skype, Ning and MySpace less regularly but at least once a week. I also have accounts on Ecademy, Hi5 and Friends Reunited.
8. What is going to be the next big thing?
It is always a bit of a guessing game but I think that users are beginning to want more control over their social networks. Facebook has annoyed a number of users through repeatedly changing the layout and editing its Terms and Conditions to give them the rights to user-generated content. A large proportion of the applications that have been created for Facebook also send out too many updates and create so much noise that they end up burying the useful information.
Therefore I think we will start seeing subject specific social networks. MySpace is a good example as when it started to lose ground to Facebook it started focusing almost solely on music. Ning is now offering a template for users to create their own social network. This has been around for a few years but up until now take up has been quite slow. Some popular bloggers and influential Tweeters have started to set up travelling, celebrity and professional focused networks with new networks being set up almost every day. The majority of these will remain ineffectual but some of them will tip and achieve rapid growth.
This change could almost be seen as a move for democracy within social networks with users having a say in content, design and the use of advertising instead of a company having full control. Social networks have given the public a voice and they do not seem afraid to use it.
9. What are you most proud of?
My proudest achievement to date is helping Changing Worlds survive the downturn in an industry that was seeing a large number of the smaller gap year companies liquidating.
You can contact Craig on craig.freeman@fwdmarketing.co.uk or phone him on 020 7623 2368. Or you can send him a tweet at @craigdfreeman.
When considering some of the great things England has given the world, Cockney rhyming slang must be right up here with fish ‘n’ chips and Monty Python. For anyone unfamiliar with the concept, Cockney rhyming slang is form of slang in which a word is replaced with another that rhymes with it e.g. stairs = apples and pears. The Cockney bit refers to those lovely folk from East London born within the sound of Bow Bells.
Any old iron er…how, because Cockney rhyming slang is a living language that continues to evolve, we thought we’d bring it bang up to date and apply it to social media and the online world. So the FWD team put their heads together and have come up with the following. Strike a light!
iPod = Brickie’s hod e.g. “Oi, can you turn your brickie down!”
iPhone = Bugsy Malone e.g. “I ‘ad me Bugsy nicked on the tube.”
Facebook = Kelly Brook e.g. “Who were you chattin’ to on Kelly Brook last night, then?”
MySpace = death and disgrace e.g. “Everyone else has left death and disgrace for Kelly Brook.”
Spam = strawberry jam e.g. “Gor blimey, me inbox is full of strawberry jam this mornin’!”
YouTube = Rubik’s Cube e.g. “I’m gonna upload that video of you falling over to Rubik’s Cube.”
Google = apple strudel e.g. “Why don’t cha just strudel it?”
Twitter = spam fritter e.g. “Naw, I deleted me spam fritter account last week.”
Tweet = sweaty feet e.g. “I going to send a sweaty about that.”
To be frank, we struggled with Linkedin and email so any suggestions for those or indeed any other cockney-techno speak most welcome. Gertcha! Now I need to get with with writing me Phileas Fogg!
Anyone with an ear to the marketing ground will have heard a good deal recently about the power of Facebook as a marketing tool. For non-users, this all seems rather baffling, and even some regular users find it hard to understand how an online social media site for swapping photos and taking quizzes can be used for serious brand communication.
Recently insidefacebook.com published a list of the most popular fan pages on Facebook, which throws some light on how marketers are using the site and its 200 million users. In order of popularity, the pages are:
Barak Obama (5.7 million fans)
Coca-Cola (3.1m fans)
Nutella (2.9m fans)
Pizza (2.8m fans)
House, the US TV series (2.6m fans)
Pringles (2.6m fans)
Manchester United’s Cristiano Ronaldo (2.5m fans)
Kinder Surprise (2.4m fans)
Windows Live Messenger (2.3m fans)
Facebook (2.3m fans)
Fan pages are micro-sites for brands, groups, interests etc which Facebook’s members join to become a fan. Fan pages to which they belong also show up on each user’s individual profile.
Not surprisingly considering the demographics of Facebook users, financial services brands did not feature in the top 30 fan pages, but I thought I’d conduct some research of my own and see what I could find. So, based on a relatively unscientific and random trawl through Facebook, I found the following fan pages:
American Express (7,711 fans)
HSBC (4,548 fans)
Mastercard (1,748 fans)
Barclays (854 fans)
Churchill the dog (532 fans)
Visa (434 fans)
AIG (120 fans)
HBOS (95 fans)
Lloyds-TSB (84 fans)
Chubb Insurance (56 fans)
Insurance (47 fans)
Santander (28 fans)
Aviva (15 fans)
AXA (9 fans)
RBS Worldpay (4 fans)
Direct Line (1 fan)
RBS (0 fans)
Looks like financial services has a got a way to go, then. Ho hum.
It’s fascinating to see something that we in the FWD Digital team have been talking about for a number of months now being reflected in the press, namely articles highlighting the increasing use of social media by disgruntled insurance claimants to vent their spleens. 
Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it’s a failure on my part to fully embrace the possibilities of social media, but recently I’ve begun to hit a blank when I think about what to put in my status updates. Not only do I have to maintain a family and a professional career, but now I also have to think about condensing my life into a series of 140 character tweets or updates and sending them out for the world’s consideration. That’s a lot of pressure!
Anyone with an ear to the marketing ground will have heard a good deal recently about the power of Facebook as a marketing tool. For non-users, this all seems rather baffling, and even some regular users find it hard to understand how an online social media site for swapping photos and taking quizzes can be used for serious brand communication.
